Fraternal correction

Today Jesus talks to us in the Gospel about fraternal correction. We are all brothers and sisters in the faith and we need to help each other. Last week we saw Jesus correcting Peter. You could say that during his life with us he actually spent three years correcting his apostles, forming them, passing the Gospel on to them, preparing them for their mission. From a human perspective he didn’t do a good job: at the end only one followed him to the cross. One betrayed him, another denied him and the others ran away.

The early Christians practiced fraternal correction; they corrected each other, they said things to each other face to face. They didn’t talk about others behind their backs. Others said of them: “See how they love one another.” People wanted to become Christians when they experienced their Christian charity. It is the best example we can give of our faith. We should love everybody, but specially our brothers and sisters in the faith. We want them to be better, to become closer to God.

Both to correct and to be corrected is hard. Our pride gets in the way. It is important not to correct when we are upset or frustrated. It is going to lose its effect. We should correct when we are serene, out of love, thinking beforehand what we are going to say and how we are going to express ourselves. We should only do it when we are close to the person we want to help. It is a good remedy against gossiping or back biting. It is very rewarding to know that the people that love us are not going to stab us in the back. We can be very honest with them.

We should be also open to correction ourselves. It is something you see in the Saints; they are very grateful when they are helped. It is not easy to be told about the mistakes we have made, but it is good for us, specially when it comes from people we know who love us. We should be grateful when our spouse, our parents, brothers and sisters, our friends, tells us things openly, face to face. I remember talking to the Managing Director of a company who was complaining: “Nobody corrects me, they are all afraid of me; they want to please me.” It happens to parish priests too. We all need to be told how can we change or improve. If nobody tells us how is it possible? Nobody is perfect. Some couples they have a moment every week when they can tell each other one thing they don’t like about the other spouse. This is what it means to be vulnerable.

It is very difficult to get to know ourselves. It is one of the most difficult things, because we are always on the inside looking out. We cannot see ourselves from outside, only through a photo or a video. The first time you record your voice it sounds strange. We all want to take a selfie to see us through the eyes of others. Look at the Holy King David. God had to send Nathan the prophet to tell him of his sin: he took somebody else’s wife and put him in a position where he was certain to be killed in battle; he didn’t realize what he had done until Nathan told him. We normally place our imperfections behind us so as not to see them. We don’t like to be aware of them or to be reminded of them. We always put our good deeds in front of us. We always think that we are better than we are. They say it is a good business that buys people by their real price and sells them at the value they think they have. We all like putting people down to place ourselves above them. Fraternal correction helps us to correct these bad tendencies.

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